Wednesday, September 30, 2009

See the Rebiya Kadeer documentary "10 Conditions of Love"

Nationwide showings Thursday, October 1, 2009

Think of it as a big middle finger to our belligerent neighbor across the Strait on their birthday, and get your asses out to see the documentary "The 10 Conditions of Love" (愛的十個條件), about the life of World Uyghur Congress leader Rebiya Kadeer (رابىيه قادىر, 熱比婭).

From an e-mail I received, here's the info about the showings with Google map links and my translations added.

Monday, September 28, 2009

Double Bill - Good News and Bad News

The good news ....

(image from Taipei Times)

It's official. The DPP has gained back one of the two Yunlin County Legislative Yuan seats, increasing their share of seats in the national LY by 1 to a total of 28, or just one seat short of 25% of all seats. The DPP's share of the vote, incidentally, was the same as Ma Ying-jeou's Presidential win in 2008 - 58%

But hold onto your horses. Although this represents to a certain degree a vote of no confidence in the KMT and/or President Ma we should remember that Yunlin is traditionally a DPP stronghold so the significance of the swing vote should not be overestimated. Additionally, as in past elections, the DPP have won, to a certain extent, owing to a split in the KMT ticket. However, those who would argue this point more strongly and against the result indicating a significant public expression of discontent with the ruling party should look at those figures combined: DPP74,272Combined Pan Blue52,025 - that's a margin of 22,247, roughly equal to the total votes of the third placed candidate.

Could it be that the local elections in December turn out more surprising results? If anything, for the sake of diversity of power and opinion in Taiwan's democracy, let's hope so.

and the bad news ....

As EVA and I were chatting tonight about the denial of a visa to Rebiya Kadeer, leader of the World Uighur Congress, some contradictions in the Government's arguments against issuing a visa became apparent:

If Kadeer 'has ties to a terrorist organisation to some degree' *, why is that organisation not listed by the ROC as such and why did none of the 28 countries she has previously visited refuse her entry? (Tip to Mike Turton for also previously suggesting this)

If Kadeer 'has ties to a terrorist organisation to some degree' *, has the ROC just declared that the US harbours terrorists? (Not that I would dispute this claim given the number of 'graduates' of the School of Americas who terrorised Central and South America from the 1950's to the 1990's that still reside in the US to avoid punishment - e.g. Bolivia's former President Goni)

This from the Taipei Times: At a separate setting at a ­Washington symposium on Taiwan on Friday, New York University law professor Jerome Cohen — who taught Ma at Harvard University — asked: “Why shouldn’t they be free to invite any visitor they want so long as that visitor is not a terrorist? Rebiya Kadeer lives in Washington … She doesn’t seem to affect the security of the city. This is nonsense. Anyone who disagrees with them [Beijing] is [branded] a terrorist,” he said.

Why did Japan feel it ok to issue Kadeer with a visa but not the ROC? Actually the answer pretty much screams itself at you the minute you take a few moments to learn the basics about Taiwanese politics - China.

According to the Premier, “Xinjiang independence is not permitted by the [Republic of China] Constitution,”. Also not permitted by the ROC constitution is the political control of its territory by any other political force, e.g. the PRC. Will the ROC now come out and state that also? No, because that part of the constitution has been effectively frozen for since at least 1991 and the Government is careful to assert this formal claim only when it wishes to claim a spurious continuing sovereignty for the ROC. It claims instead that mutual non-recognition of the ROC(KMT) and PRC(CCP) is a basis for its modus vivendi policy that has delivered nothing for Taiwanese 'goodwill' in return from China except perhaps pandas and dependency on Chinese tourist dollars.

Has the blacklist returned, this time penned by Beijing?

Is freedom of speech and democracy only to be enjoyed by Taiwanese people in Taiwan?. Can foreigners not also enjoy these rights?

The Premier again: "Asked if he believed that Kadeer, a nominee for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize, would launch terrorist attacks, Wu said: “Neither you nor I can fully understand all the details, but the MOI, the National Immigration Agency and other [government] units understand what the situation is in the international community.” Oh really? In one short statement, the Premier just effectively patronised every Taiwanese citizen as being incapable of comprehending the complex factors that Government agencies must take into account when making decisions - Government agencies that are staffed by ordinary Taiwanese. We are supposed to sit back and say, "Oh well, the MOI, NIA and other Government units had lots of good reasons for making this technical and complex decision so I'll trust in their better judgment." The Premier even tells us this is what he will do because it is too complex for him! What you just witnessed was the formally most powerful political person in Taiwan telling everyone to not concern themselves with things they can't comprehend and that the visa decision is therefore un-debatable. Nothing to see here folks. Move along.

Sunday, September 20, 2009

The injustice of the verdict against Chen Shui-bian

It's no surprise Ma Ying-jeou never passed the bar exam

On September 11th, 2009, Taiwan's former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment. This development will certainly divert people's attention from the poor performance of current president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) during the Typhoon Morakot rescue effort -- a performance which brought his approval rating down to a record low of 16 percent.

But Chen's case stinks not only because Taiwan does not have a set of healthy tax regulations but also because the testimony of criminal suspect Jeffrey Koo, Jr. (辜仲諒) was used to convict Chen in exchange for dropping charges against Koo.

The fact that Ma was able to ignore the overwhelming stench of this case while his Harvard Law School mentor felt sad about it leads me to conclude that it's not surprising to learn that Ma never passed the bar exam!

Ma's former mentor Jerome Cohen is certainly not proud of his former student. This is how Cohen reacted instead:

"It is a very sad day, it is also a very important day."

And how could Cohen not be sad? He had earlier given Ma a hint about Chen's human rights, but Ma didn't pay any attention.

Now the kangaroo court is going to lay more charges on Chen, and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT)-dominated Legislative Yuan is proposing yet another unfair law "decriminalizing" the use of the fund by government chiefs. This change will victimize only Chen while letting suspects in many previous corruption cases go free and will make things easier for future government officials to misuse their special allowances. If the new amendment is passed, pending corruption cases against KMT party members will be conveniently dismissed.

However, an English version of Chen's defense is available on a non-profit educational organization's site. and links are provided under "References" below.

I hope my analysis below will provide guidance to the people of Taiwan who may know very little about how political donations are dealt with elsewhere in the world and were blindly influenced by the pan-blue media in Taiwan into believing that Chen Shui-bian is guilty as charged. After all, a person is presumed innocent until proved guilty, and Chen should be treated with no exception.

Chen's unspent donations left over from previous election campaignsFirst, I would like to introduce some forms which are readily available from the Internet, and which are common knowledge to tax practitioner in North America: "information returns" and "trust returns" like the ones below.

This is the information return (T2092) which is filed annually by a registered party or a registered association to show the total contributions received, and all the slips detailing each contributor's amount of contribution and his name and address must be kept for 2 years for possible selective inspection by a government auditor.

But this type of information return does not exist in Taiwan because the KMT does not want to disclose their secret financial dealings and its total donations received.

The information provided at the link above gives clear guidance to the subject discussed. Pay special attention to points 25, 26, 27, 28 (maximum deduction of $650 from tax payable so no one will benefit from a huge donation and consequently avoiding bribery), and 32 (no carry over of unused deductions to the following tax year).

But in Taiwan, the KMT does not want to pay taxes to the government on its investment income or business income or capital gains on sales of properties, nor do they want to return the assets to their rightful owners -- the people of Taiwan and to the now-defunct UNRRA -- so none of the aforementioned tax forms exist in Taiwan.

In other words, the KMT is like a criminal organization running some business enterprises while avoiding taxes along the way. And the transactions between the party and some key members of the party cannot be verified to be dealing at arm's length whereas the transactions between the party and the state were known to be indistinguishable during its terms in power.

In this respect, I find that the regulations in Taiwan needed serious overhaul.

In Chen's case, since no such filing requirements exist for political parties in Taiwan, it follows that the DPP wouldn't be able to file any returns similar to the ones mentioned above, nor would Chen be able to locate every last one of his supporters who donated to his election campaign and return the money to them (Which donors would get how much money back?) and ask them to donate again in future to other DPP candidates. So what could be done with the money left from Chen's election donations?

Chen couldn't report it under his personal income tax return -- nor should he have. Because the fund is for the purposes of his election or for other DPP functions, he knew that whenever there was a DPP event or whenever DPP candidates needed money for elections, he would be able to draw from these funds. In the meantime, moving the leftover donations abroad for investment was wise, and there was nothing wrong with that, otherwise he would have been subject to personal income taxes on this fund. That would have been an incorrect classification because this fund was not for his personal enjoyment. Moving money abroad did not constitute money laundering unless the prosecutors could establish that the money was obtained not from the donation leftovers but from a criminal act, e.g., money which belonged to the country.

There might have been disagreements between Chen and his wife as to how the money in this fund would be used, and perhaps his wife would have even liked to keep some (if not all) for their own family. While that would amount to selfishness, it wouldn't be a crime.

Additionally, people may have donated to Chen while not donating to other DPP candidates simply because people admired Chen so much for being a good Taiwanese role model who grew from a poor boy who almost had to drop out of school in order to work to help feed his family into a Taipei mayor with good record and, eventually, a national leader seeking reelection.

So, with the lack of Taiwan's tax regulations regarding political parties' information returns and/or tax returns, Chen couldn't be guilty on account of how the leftover donations were handled. While the KMT had all kinds of investment income and capital gains, they had never paid a cent of tax to the country -- this is tax avoidance.

The state affairs fund is similar in nature to the special allowances fund provided for administrative heads of government. The regulations governing both are loose and resemble guidelines more than strict laws. The application and reimbursement procedures of the state affairs fund have always been conducted in accordance with established practices. No one, from former President Chen and his aides to accountants in the Accounting Department of the Office of the President, has had any intention to commit crimes or corruption or to take money for their own pockets. They simply had inherited imperfect application and reimbursement procedures, which were the established practice left by the previous governments. This imperfect procedure can and should be reformed, but no one should be selectively charged with corruption simply because he or she had followed the previous governments' practice.

President Chen had, on his own initiative, cut his monthly salary by half, which means that his annual income was reduced by NT$5 million per year resulting in an NT$40 million reduction of his salary over his eight-year presidency. He had also, on his own discretion, terminated the Fongtian project and the Dangyang project, two secret National Security Bureau funds totaling NT$3.6 billion that used to be called "the President's private money." Moreover, he had donated all of his presidential election subsidies of more than NT$340 million. How then could such a president have any motive for embezzling a paltry NT$104 million from the state affairs fund? Further, in that fund, Chen has listed all fund expenses to prove that the total amount of expenditures from that fund had far exceeded the original amount allotted to it. For that reason, the accusation in the bill of indictment that "[Chen] had raised funds from other sources to pay for the expenses he listed, but he still put the state affairs fund into his private pocket" is more than absurd!

In addition to the above points, the unreliable testimony by Jeffrey Koo, Jr. -- who was cleared of any criminal charges by implicating Chen as being involved in a land deal -- also played a crucial role. However, throughout the indictment, the prosecutors assumed that Chen directed his wife (who didn't hold any public post) to act on behalf of him (who held a public post). We should all know that a person without an official post couldn't commit the crime of corruption; therefore, in order to convict Chen, the court had to assume -- without proof -- that Chen was the mastermind and that he directed his wife to commit the act of corruption.

It is widely believed that while Chen was so occupied with national affairs that he actually let his wife handle the family's financial affairs. If there's anything for Chen to regret, it would have been that he should have paid much more attention to what his wife was doing instead of being such a damn good Taiwanese nationalist leader, for it angered both China and the United States, causing him to be labeled as a troublemaker.

Chen's priority was always how to make Taiwan a normal nation, as he describes here in Block C of this interview on CNN's TalkAsia:

[Q. by Anjali Rao:] President you're now in the last term of your presidency what are your priorities now?

A: As the leader of this nation, I want to make Taiwan into a normal country. Even though Taiwan is an independent, sovereign country, it is not yet a normal and complete country. Why do I say that Taiwan is not yet a normal country? Because if it were, it would be a member of the UN family and also be the member of the World Health Organization. Why do I say that Taiwan is not yet a complete country? Because our current Constitution has never been approved by our people. The 23 million people of Taiwan really need a new Taiwan constitution that is timely, relevant, and viable.

I want to put the emphasis on striking a good balance between prosperity and social justice and equity. Therefore, our main policy goals include increasing investment in Taiwan, continuing to create more job opportunities, bridging the gap between urban and rural areas, as well as decreasing the gap between the rich and poor. These are our major policy goals.

The opinion from Chen's original lawyer about the unconstitutional change of the presiding judge to Tsai stated that the case should have been reverted back to the judge who was handling the case from the beginning, i.e. judge Chou Chan-chun (周占春) [Taiwan Matters translation]:

陳水扁原辯護律師鄭文龍表示，扁案從周占春合議庭被換到蔡守訓合議庭，違反法定法官原則，他認為全案違憲而且無效。

Chen Shui-bian's original lawyer Cheng Wen-lung said that since Chou Chan-chun was replaced with Tsai Shou-hsun by the procedural committee, this violates judicial principles, and he believed that this rendered the entire case unconstitutional and invalid.

Cheng said, "We are confident that the Council of Grand Justices will declare this case unconstitutional. Since this is an unconstitutional ruling, it surely is an invalid ruling. The best way to deal with this in an appeals court (AKA "court of second instance") would be to dismiss and return the case to the first court proceeding ("court of first instance") for the original judge, Chou Chan-chun. Because of the order in which this trial has proceeded, we believe that the case is still under judge Chou's jurisdiction."

Asked whether it was appropriate for the judge to have been changed half-way through Chen's trial, Cohen said it would have been reasonable if judge Tsai Shou-hsun (蔡守訓) had taken up and presided over the Taipei District Court's collegiate panel right from the start.

Because the judges were changed after the case had started, it was natural that there was public doubt over the matter, he said.

The chaos resulting from the recent erosion of justice in Taiwan reveals two key personnel who -- like cancer cells -- should have been removed immediately from the government's posts. A brief background check for them revealed some interesting details.

The first of these is Minister of JusticeWang Ching-feng (王清峰), who was the chairperson of the unconstitutional, pan-blue-dominated "319 Truth Commission" (319 槍擊事件真相調查特別委員會) (MORE: 1, 2, 3), a committee that tried to overturn Chen's 2004 presidential election victory by claiming that Chen staged the March 19, 2004 assassination attempt on himself in order to win sympathy votes.

The case [which voided the criminal corruption conviction of former US senator Ted Stevens-R] also illustrates the importance of having a justice department chief courageous enough to repudiate his staff's misconduct, replace the offending prosecutors, initiate an investigation and drop the charges.

The second one is judge Tsai Shou-hsun, who just happens to be the judge who acquitted Ma Ying-Jeou for his involvement in his special allowance corruption case and jailed Ma's secretary, Yu Wen, instead.

Cohen's "Lesson in Integrity for All" also contains another hidden message for Tsai:

Several times during the trial, Judge Emmet Sullivan, prompted by dynamic defence counsel, reprimanded prosecutors for withholding evidence, and sought to remedy any damage to the defence.

Chen's case has caused outrage among the people in the English blogosphere. One example can be read here:

If you look at the evidence, it's actually fairly weak. One of the charges was to do with a land transaction for a science park. I don't believe testimony actually showed Chen's connection to it, just that of his wife. But, with almost all the charges, the prosecutor said "how could Chen not know". I'm not sure how why husbands are responsible for the crimes of their wives.

What Chen was guilty of was taking advantage of a big hole in Taiwanese law that allows politicians to deal with surplus campaign funds as they see fit. There were proposals to close this during Chen's presidencies, but the KMT-controlled legislature strangely cut them all down. So I'm not sure how that's a crime either, least of all money-laundering. To launder money it has to be obtained illegally, from criminal proceeds, etc. If the law doesn't say Chen wasn't entitled to keep it, moving it around can't possibly be money-laundering.

People say that Ma is keeping Chen in prison because Ma cannot continue to deceive the people of Taiwan without Chen being around to divert attention; in case you haven't noticed, the Mandarin word for "cheat" or "deceive" is piàn​ (騙), which is formed by combining two characters. Ironically, the left half is Ma's surname, which means "horse" (馬), and the right half is the latter half of the former president's given name: Bian (扁). Ma wishes to keep A-bian behind bars so A-bian's case can help Ma to continue deceiving the nation by drawing away attention from his poor performance.

Taiwanese people who divide themselves among pro-Chen or anti-Chen camps should view the whole situation from a broader scope. Since the Ma administration came into power in 2008, justice and rule of law in Taiwan are swiftly being eroded. Something has to be done quickly to stop this.

The KMT is not just a simple political party -- it is a criminal organization engaged in tax avoidance economic activities, and has never paid a cent of tax to the country on its investment and other business or capital gains income. They have illegally sold properties and assets misappropriated from the Taiwanese people and of international aid to private owners.

If the heavy fines imposed on the accused in Chen's case are paid, they will eventually wind up in the combined KMT government's coffers to assist the party in its subsequent criminal activities, e.g. tax avoidance economic activities and vote-buying schemes, resulting in a vicious cycle.

As Chen Shui-bian pointed out in the TalkAsia interview, the people of Taiwan have never approved the ROC constitution which has been used to govern Formosa since the arrival of the KMT per General Order no. 1. They never had a chance to conduct a fair election independent from the ROC constitution and were consequently deprived of the chance to have a normal functional legislative body to pass fair laws.

Taiwanese abroad should hold a demonstration in front of the UN, and the people of Taiwan should protest in front of the American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) to demand the confiscation of all the assets of the KMT criminal organization and evict that party from Taiwan. It is a Chinese party which should not participate in Taiwanese elections. Since there is no longer any hostility between the two Chinese parties (the KMT, and the CCP), the KMT's ROC government should terminate its exile status and return to its origins -- namely, any territory in China -- and let the de facto independent Taiwan become a normal nation.

According to recent surveys conducted by Academia Sinica and the Web site Yahoo! Kimo, over 50 percent of the people do not believe in Taiwan's judicial system and over 75 percent have no confidence that the Judicial Yuan will undertake judicial reform [...]

* May 22, 2009: An estimable group of scholars and writers -- 26 in all, and each one with a deep understanding of Taiwan and the surrounding facts -- has composed an open letter addressed directly to President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九). The letter addresses the ever-increasing problems with judicial fairness, press freedom, the lack of transparency in the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) rapprochement with China, the loss of Taiwan's sovereignty, and the loss of human rights. The argument the letter makes is rock solid. It is based on demonstrable facts.

Friday, September 11, 2009

Honest Self-Assessment?

In my limited experience, the key to being reflexive to feedback is to evaluate oneself critically and to demonstrate, in word and deed, that you can see both the mistakes and successes on your record, subsequently using that assessment to improve your performance. This is especially important for political leaders. In the UK, hubris would not be considered an attractive or confidence building personality. Typhoon Morakot showed that Taiwanese also have limited tolerance for arrogance. Despite this, it is strange that Taiwan's President would make the following comments: (and these on cross-strait policy)

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) yesterday told guests at the Presidential Office that there was much room for improvement in terms of solidifying the rule of law in Taiwan,but congratulated himself for what he said was his careful exercise of power.

Ma said that those in power had to guard against corruption and abusing their authority.

Citing the example of calls for him to declare a state of emergency amid the crisis left behind by Typhoon Morakot, Ma said he would have risked abusing his power had he given in to public pressure.

“I’d like to leave a legacy of building a country based on the rule of law,” he said. “That is the main reason why I am willing to find time to see you today.” (Seemingly, Cohen's previous criticisms have stung Ma - this is hardly a warm welcome)

If a leader congratulates him or herself I tend to be immediately suspicious. It seems a very transparent and slightly desperate attempt write the historical record in their own favour, rather than let public opinion be the judge. It is the next claim however, that Ma would risk abusing his own power if he had declared a state of emergency, that is at the very least strange if not outright illogical.

Does Ma mean that declaring a state of emergency would would have put him in conflict with the constitutional limits of the power of his position or does he mean that if he had declared a state of emergency, he would then have had such increased powers that he would be unable to stop himself abusing them?

Perhaps there's something lost in the translation, but on the face of it Ma's comments indicate that the President lacks skills in reasoning and rational debate which would allow him to make a much better case to support his decisions. One contrast between Ma and Chen is apt here. Chen fought his way through local and then national politics to become first Taipei Mayor and then President. Along the way, he had to win a war of words with many a tough opponent, both in the DPP and the KMT. As a trained lawyer, Chen was able to clearly articulate his vision, inspire and maintain confidence in his leadership. That was until about 2006. In the early 1990's Ma and Chen went head to head in a public debate. I forget the details but in the video I saw, it was Chen who won the crowd with fast and pithy responses. A younger looking Ma was left fumbling for his words. Fast forward to the present day and Ma as President seemingly continues to lack the skill of oration or clear elucidation of argument. This may in part be attributable to the way Ma rose up to become President. In contrast to Chen, Ma was a loyal secretary to Chiang Jing-guo and his father was a mid-ranked party member who was actively shaping his son for a role that Ma perhaps did not readily choose for himself. Ma's experience was not of engaging with the democratic process, and having the experience shape and deepen his character, but rather be selected, outside of merit, on the basis of who he was rather than what he was. This may be one of the reasons why as soon as a real disaster befell his nation, Ma turned out to be less the competent executive than the media had built him up to be. In a way, if in his election campaign, Ma and pro-KMT media had painted him is terms less rosy then the high expectations and subsequent disappointment could have been avoided.

Bloomberg blows Ma Ying-jeou's ratings up like a balloon

Ma’s approval dropped to a record low of 29 percent after the typhoon claimed so many lives, according to an Aug. 18 survey of 919 adults conducted by the United Daily News. The poll had a margin of error of 3.29 percentage points. About 46 percent of respondents didn’t have confidence in his administration’s relief and rebuilding efforts in the aftermath of the storm.

Bloomberg's number increases Ma's actual rating by almost 45 percent (13 percentage points). As I wrote on August 20 [highlighting added this time around]:

When TVBS says their own guy is doing this bad, he's doing much worse.(Click to enlarge)

I sent an e-mail with the above information to both Culpan and Ong last night just to be sure that these Taiwan-based reporters hadn't somehow overlooked the huge news about Ma's 16 percent approval rating. Yet approximately 24 hours later, there hasn't been any sort of reply, so I think that it's safe to say at this point that they either published this "error" on purpose or simply don't care about the facts.

As of 9:50 PM September 9, a figure which was off by almost 45% (and which was already pointed out to the authors) remained in this Bloomberg article.(Click to enlarge)

Taiwan won't attempt to seek UN membership this year, officials said Friday, in a move one observer said was aimed at patching up ties with Beijing after the Dalai Lama's visit.

"Instead of asking our allies to submit a proposal to join the United Nations, we will seek other kinds of meaningful participation," said a foreign ministry official.

"It is a change of method but we will not give up the Taiwan people's right to join the UN."

[...]

Last year, Taipei made an attempt to join the World Meteorological Organization and other specialised UN agencies rather than seeking full UN membership.

Here are some of my observations derived from the controversial statements made by the unnamed official from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

First, the official stated that "we will not give up the rights of the people of Taiwan to join the UN"; however, when the Ma government suddenly lets go of the chance to apply for UN membership after Taiwan made 16 consecutive annual attempts previously, how does this government expect anyone to believe them when they say they are "not giv[ing] up the Taiwan people's right to join the UN"?

Second, UN Resolution 2758 -- which stated that Chiang Kai-shek's (蔣介石) representative would be expelled from the UN's China seat and be replaced by a representative of the PRC government in Beijing -- did not mention anything about the Taiwanese people's right to join the UN or Taiwan's seat. (See Tim Maddog's earlier post: "Taiwan isn't China's.") Furthermore, it was the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA -- eventually replaced by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR] in 1952) that assigned the ROC to administer post-WWII Formosa, if there were any arguments about representation between China and Taiwan, it should be resolved at the source of problem, namely the UN, which is responsible for the creation of this problem. The representation of China (ROC or PRC) was already addressed by UN resolution 2758. The residents of Taiwan have been fighting for their rights internally against the ROC administration and externally against the PRC government's unlawful claim to represent them.

Third, the Ma administration stated that they had made attempts to join the World Meteorological Organization, but a simple check of region II of the map on their website (I even checked the region V, just to be sure) shows that neither Taiwan nor Chinese Taipei (to use Ma's favorite term to describe Taiwan) is a member. If Taiwan were a member, the information received from the WMO would probably have helped Taiwan's Central Weather Bureau to forecast typhoons more accurately. So, the report card shows a grade of "Zero" for last year's so-called "attempts" by the Ma government.

Fourth, in 2007, former president Chen Shui-bian had applied for Taiwan's UN bid as early as July, Ma's statement in September showed that no matter what excuses he provides, he does everything too slowly, ranging from the Typhoon Morakot rescue to the UN membership bid to possibly even Swine Flu (A[H1N1]) prevention, this continual inaction leads us to wonder what we elect a president for. Who is Ma working for: the Taiwanese or our neighbor across the Strait who have at least 1,500 missiles targeting us?

Fifth, the so-called change of method regarding meaningful participation was demonstrated to Taiwanese residents this past spring by way of Health Minister Yeh Ching-chuan's temporary attendance at the World Health Assembly (WHA), which was subject to annual approval by China in exchange for selling out Taiwan's sovereignty, not to mention the lack of any progress in securing an independent membership at the World Health Organization (WHO) as desired by the people of Taiwan. Therefore, it is a dangerous move by the Ma administration to continue using the WHA model to gain access to international organizations by being an associate member under Beijing's seat, or under Beijing's permission via a secret Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the CCP and the KMT parties.

On behalf of all residents of Taiwan, the bloggers of Taiwan Matters would like to ask all residents and friends of Taiwan who value the universality of the UN and the rights of Taiwanese people to join the UN to continue signing this existing petition on www.GoPetition.com to counter Ma's inaction on this issue and the PRC's false representation. (Only sign once. If you've already done so, please encourage others to do so as well.) While you're at it, there's another petition on that site that could use your signature, too: "Remove Missiles Pointed At Taiwan 移除所有的導彈對準台灣." What are you waiting for? Go sign now!